The Understanding
by Krstee
Summary: No one batted an eyelash when the police informed the town that Shelly had killed herself. She had few friends, no boyfriend, no job, and no money. One person, though, knows the real cause of her death. [[OneShot]] [[Very minor KylexStan]]


He'd spent so long hating her, he'd almost forgotten she was family. Too late did this realization come, as most realizations do.

It had been marked as a suicide, which seemed natural among the teen populace these days. She was 19, without a job, living with her parents, never had a real boyfriend, bad grades, few friends… and so not too many people were shocked when they learned she had done the deed.

At her tombstone, as everyone else, adorned in their black attire, faded away, one boy stayed.

He fell to his knees on the freshly turned earth that was the final resting place of Shelly Marsh.

He grabbed a handful of dirt, silent tremors gripping him.

He wished it would rain. He deserved to be drenched and miserable. He didn't deserve to be given condolences today. He didn't deserve anything.

It wasn't a suicide. How does driving over an icy cliff qualify as suicide?

Worse than the fact that everyone was alright with believing that Shelly had killed herself, was that Stan knew he was responsible.

It was a thought that seemed to numb his entire body. It was something so foreign, something so unbelievable… just to even think that he could've been the cause of another's death.

Especially his older sister's.

It wasn't as though they had a loving sibling relationship. It was anything from. She tortured him whenever she could. She beat him up to take out her own frustrations of her own failure of a life.  
She just wanted someone to feel the pain she was feeling.

Hurting her little brother made her feel better. She was satisfied knowing someone was more insignificant than she was.

But as he got older, things became worse. Stan was good looking, no one denied it. Stan was athletic, everyone saw it. Stan was popular, and everyone knew it. It was her senior year, and his freshman year, that sparked the flame for a fire that would consume her. She was no longer Shelly. She was no longer even brace face. No. As soon as that twit of a little brother of hers joined high school, she became Stan's sister.

She would hear it everywhere she went,

"Oh, look! That's Stan's sister."

"Oh, hey, you know that JV quarterback? That's his sister!"

Worst of all was when they were ever in the same perimeter. Cries of,

"Hey, Marsh!"

Would send both their head flying. But 99 of the time, it was to Stan.

She suffered endlessly through high school, knowing she couldn't beat him up anymore. If she did, his little fans wouldn't give her a moments rest.

Slowly she became obsessed with the matter. Hating every last thing about Stan. Waiting so patiently for the day she'd be able to take revenge on her little brother.

She didn't really worry about college, or a job. When she was 20, she'd become her dad's secretary. She finally put it on herself to gain a hobby, though, and had settled on track and field.

There was still only one person faster than Stan, and that was the person who had always been in hot pursuit of him.

She began going to the North Park Rec. Center everyday to work out, and it was there that she came the closest she'd ever been to having a real boyfriend. His name was Kevin, and he ran there, because it was the only free, heated place a body could go to run, when it was freezing outside.

She learned he was actually one of her little brother's friend's brother, that had a large disliking of his siblings as well.

And so, for almost 7 months, she was distracted by him. She nearly completely forgot her fervor hate towards Stan she had possessed only months prior. She was losing weight, becoming more open (at least to Kevin), and all around she seemed more cheery than she'd ever been.

Things were going smooth, until the day Stan was found in the park.

With his best friend Kyle

Lip locked.

And topless.

Stan, her little brother. Stan, the so called jock of the year, was actually a complete rainbow child.

Inwardly, she smiled. Inwardly, all the progress she had begun to make in becoming a better person collapsed on top of itself. This was it. This was what she had needed to get her revenge.

She knew all his friends would leave him after finding out. No one would even want to touch him.

No one but her.

It was right after school, and right after he had come home. Their parents were off somewhere, which left Shelly poised ready next to the couch.

The moment he walked in the door, she grabbed him by the scruff of the collar, and tossed him towards the couch. She straddled him, pinning his arms behind his head with one carefully placed hand.

For a moment, he thought he was about to be raped by his own sister, until the other hand, balled in a fist, made contact with his face, immediately spurting blood from his nose.

"Shel..!" he shouted, cut off by his sister chucking him to the ground, where she proceeded to kick the shit out of him.

He eventually grabbed a leg that was about to make contact with his already heavily bruised side, and pushed her backwards.

Taking his opportunity, he jumped up, assuming a defensive stature.

"What the hell are you doing?" His voice rang through the empty house, giving him the first realization that no one else was home.

"Whaddya think, turd? Beating the shit out of you!"

She said, lunging for him again. He quickly side stepped this, jumping back even further.

"Why?!?" he asked incredulously.

"Because, you ruined my life!!!"

She stopped attacking, yet continued to seethe and glare at him from across,

"What?!?! How could you even say that! I never do a fucking thing to you! You're the one who always hurts me!"

"If it wasn't for you, I'd be an only child! Mom and Dad wouldn't have you to judge me by you! I might've had a name other than "Stan's sister" through high school!"

"And your really blaming me for those? I can't help that Mom gave birth to me, and it's not my fucking fault you never made a name for yourself enough to be recognized!!"

He shouted, anger washing over him,

"If it bothered you so much, why didn't you do something about it? Why didn't you join a club and make friends? Why didn't you ask me to help you? I'll tell you why! Because rather than take the time to fix something wrong, you'd rather put the blame on someone else, and make sure they feel just as much pain as you do!! Your such a fucking loser! No friends, no boyfriend, no job, no money!"

He paused, waiting for her to respond. When she didn't he continued,

"Admit it! For the first time in your life, admit it! It's always been this way. You beat me up as a kid because you didn't think I should get anything more than you did. You threw me around because you needed to make sure someone else besides you was feeling pain."

He growled, throwing his fists to his side,

"Y'know, I'd almost hoped you were changing. With that boyfriend of yours, I thought you were finally starting to grow up and see the error of your ways. What, did he break up with you? Is that why your suddenly taking out your emotions on your old punching bag? Oh, or let me guess. I'm ruining your life even further by the fact that you have a gay brother?"

She snarled back, trying to hide the fact that his attacks had hurt her. Or more so that they were true, which made them sting even more.

"Not quite, dumbfuck. I never touched you in high school, because your friends were always around. I knew if I was to lay a finger on you, one of your shit faced friends would be after me. But now what, Stan?"

She said, choosing to ignore all the personal stabs he had just made to her,

"Your safety net is gone! Your friends probably want nothing to do with you."

She stops as he chuckles.

"Is that really what you think? Is that really how you see humanity? That if people who love you find the slightest thing off about you, they'll discard you forever? That's sad, Shelly, really it is."

He sighed, relaxing his posture. He leaned against the left arm of the arm chair,

"Sure, I didn't get a golden globe for unwillingly coming out to my friends, but…"

He stopped, turning now sad eyes to his sister,

"That doesn't mean they couldn't see past it. It's unexpected and weird for them, but we're friends. And that means we help each other out no matter what. I guess you wouldn't understand that…"

Another stab. And just one stab too far.

She sat on the couch opposite, looking everywhere but his eyes.

"Shelly…"

He began,

"It took me a while to figure out why you always wanted to hurt me, and even when I did figure it out… I did nothing. I'm sorry I never tried to help you…"

He was cut off,

"What, like your friends helped you? Sorry, but we aren't friends."

She snapped.

"No, but you are my sister."

He said sternly

"Though no one would ever guess it."

He murmured. He knew his talk had gotten to her. Now he had only one question left.

"Why couldn't you ever have been it, Shelly? Why couldn't you ever be my sister? I should've been able to come home and cry to you about how my friends stole my Terrance and Phillip dolls. So why when I came home, was I scared to ever even be near you? Why did my pain make you feel better?"

He stopped, his head hanging, and his eyes staring at a piece of the ground. His eyesight was blurred by his hair hanging over his face, and tears.

"Wouldn't my happiness have made you happy too?"

He didn't look at her, and wasn't surprised when she didn't respond.

"I grew up hating you. I learned why you hated me, and then hated you even more. I hated you for not being able to see past your own pride to try and even think that you should help me to have more than you did. Isn't that the job of the older sibling? To teach the younger one from their own mistakes?"

Then he did look up to her, hoping for an answer.  
When one didn't come, he frowned. She hadn't accepted his apology. She hadn't apologized. She wasn't even talking. His frown deepened even more, as he crossed his arms.

That was it then. She still hated him, which meant…  
"I'll probably always hate you, Shelly." he spat at her, before exiting the room, and walking up the stairs.

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Stan awoke to the sound of sirens and crying the next morning.

That's when he learned of what had happened.

Shelly, on her way to her boyfriends house, had driven off the road.

To her death.

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As Stan kneeled by the mound of Earth that covered his sister, he scrunched his hands in his hair. Those dumb ass cops. Shelly hadn't driven off the road to commit suicide. She hadn't committed suicide because she had come to realize how much of a loser she was.

She was so caught up in her own emotions that she didn't even notice the ice on the road. He knew that was how it had happened. She was so distraught over her little brother whom she thought she hated tell her he hated her, that she had decided to seek comfort from her boyfriend.

She didn't care that Stan had plucked her apart, and understood every aspect of herself… somehow, she knew he always had. She cared only that even after analyzing her so fully, Stan hated her to ever last detail… the only person who knew her completely, hated her.

She'd never had real friends. She'd never really loved anyone. But the fact that her little brother knew so much… and had hated her all along while knowing her inside and out… it was too much to bear. It was then she must've wondered if her true self was impossible to love, which would explain her going to her boyfriend's.

"You're so stupid…" Stan whimpered, into the ground.

"I'm the brother you always hated… of course I had to pretend like I hated you back… that doesn't mean other people wouldn't have loved you…"

It was the best thing Stan could say, while still being honest. Even as he looked at her grave, wishing she was alive, he knew they could never have loved each other. The time had passed for the possibility of a loving relationship, and neither of them had been willing to work on it at the time.

Stan felt a hand touch his shoulder, and he looked up into the sympathetic eyes of Kyle.

Kyle… the person who had been the only one who knew just as well as he about Shelly.

"It wasn't suicide…" Stan murmured, sniffing a few times.

"I know…" Kyle said in a calming voice, rubbing circle's along Stan's back.

"It was my fault…" Stan said, in a hushed voice.

"No. No it wasn't. The last thing you did was help her. You helped her to realize what love really is, and you helped her to see that she needed to change, from failing to gain yours. If the accident hadn't happened… she would've gone on to learn from your words, and to stop trying to use other people as her emotional dumping grounds."

"But she died…"

Kyle cut him off,

"She died at a high point. She died finally realizing what it was that could make her happy."

Stan looked up, his eyes swollen from tears,

"Is that supposed to be good news?" he said, bitterly

"The only bit there is right now, I'm afraid."

Kyle stood up, offering Stan a hand up.

"Y'know… I gave her one last chance. In that argument we had. I apologized to her for never helping…"

Stan said, pulling himself up with Kyle's aid.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Nothing else was said. Nothing else needed to be said. Stan said he wanted a few more moments alone, and Kyle complied.

Stan was smiling, as he looked back to the grave.

"Is it true, Shelly? What I said really made you realize something?"

He stopped, a silent tear drop falling from his eye.

"I'm sorry I said I would always hate you. After you didn't tell me why you couldn't be my sister, I thought you were actually thinking of the reasons why I couldn't be like a brother to you. Was it really the opposite? Were you really considering why YOU weren't capable of fulfilling the position to take care of me?"

Stan questioned, already knowing the answer.

"I'm sorry you never got to put my words to use. Who knows, maybe you would've started being nice to me even?"

His smile returned,

"Nah, too much of an old habit, right?"

He turned on his heel, to see Kyle getting in his car. He began walking, before swiftly turning back, a gentle smile lingering on his lips.

"I love you, Shelly."

He said loudly, and saying them for the first time in his life. He savored the words, and cherished them as they rolled off his lips.

He looked at the tombstone, and read,

"Loving daughter and sister."

And for the first time, he didn't argue their truth.

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AN: I've never written about Shelly… I wanted to do a quick oneshot with her. I actually really love her character.


End file.
